Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump on Saturday came to the battlefield town of Gettysburg in Pennsylvania to announce his plans for his first 100 days in office, and also to threaten the women who have accused him of sexual assault.
Among the first steps, he said he would take if elected, are declaring China a currency manipulator, cancelling payments to UN for combating climate change and renegotiating NAFTA.
"This is my pledge to you, and if we follow these steps, we will once again have a government of, by and for the people," Trump said, invoking a phrase from President Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.
"I'm not a politician, and have never wanted to be one. But when I saw the trouble our country was in, I knew I couldn't stand by and watch any longer. Our country has been so good to me, I love our country, I felt I had to act," Trump said in his address in Gettysburg, Pennsylvania.
"Change has to come from outside this broken system. The fact that the Washington establishment has tried so hard to stop our campaign is only more proof that our campaign represents the kind of change that only arrives once in a lifetime," he said while releasing details of his plans which he described as a 'Contract with the American voter'.
He urged the American people to "rise above the noise and the clutter of broken politics" and to embrace faith and optimism that has always been the central ingredient in the American character.
"I am asking you to dream big," the 70-year-old business tycoon asserted.
"What follows is my 100-day action plan to Make America Great Again. It is a contract between Donald J Trump and the American voter ?- and begins with restoring honesty, accountability and change to Washington," Trump said.
Among his other first 100 days measures included a lifetime ban on White House officials to lobby on behalf of foreign governments, a requirement that for every new federal regulation, two existing regulations must be eliminated, a five year-ban on White House and Congressional officials becoming lobbyists after they leave government service and a complete ban on foreign lobbyists raising money for American elections.
This, he said, would clean up the corrupt system.
Trump said on his first day, he would announce his intention to renegotiate North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) or withdraw from the deal under Article 2205.
"I will announce our withdrawal from the Trans-Pacific Partnership. I will direct my Secretary of the Treasury to label China a currency manipulator. I will direct the Secretary of Commerce and US Trade Representative to identify all foreign trading abuses that unfairly impact American workers and direct them to use every tool under American and international law to end those abuses immediately," he said.
"I will lift the restrictions on the production of USD 50 trillion dollars worth of job-producing American energy reserves, including shale, oil, natural gas and clean coal. I will lift the Obama-Clinton roadblocks and allow vital energy infrastructure projects, like the Keystone Pipeline, to move forward and I will cancel billions in payments to UN climate change programs and use the money to fix Americas water and environmental infrastructure," Trump said.
Speaking near the site where Abraham Lincoln gave his Gettysburg address in 1863, Trump also pledged to sue every woman who has accused him of sexual assault.
He called them "liars" whose allegations he blamed Democrats for orchestrating.
"All of these liars will be sued once the election is over," Trump said. He added later: "I look so forward to doing that."
Trump's blunt threat of legal action eclipsed his planned focus on serious-minded policy during a speech in Gettysburg. Though his campaign had billed the speech as a chance for Trump to lay out a to-do list for his first 100 days as president, he seemed unable to restrain himself from re-litigating grievances with Hillary Clinton, the media and especially the women who have come forward in recent days.
A spokeswoman for Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton said that Trumps’ speech was “rambling, unfocused, full of conspiracy theories and attacks on the media”.
Speaking to reporters aboard her campaign plane between rallies in Pennsylvania, Clinton said that, after three debates, she was no longer thinking about responding to what Trump says anymore and would "let the American people decide what he offers and what we offer."
Nearly a dozen women have publicly accused Trump of unwanted advances or sexual assault in the weeks since a 2005 recording emerged in which the former reality TV star boasted of kissing women and groping their genitals without their consent. The latest came on Saturday, when an adult film actress said the billionaire kissed her and two other women on the lips "without asking for permission" when they met him after a golf tournament in 2006.
Trump has denied all the allegations, while insisting some of the women weren't attractive enough for him to want to pursue.
